Olaf Raymond Eide

Guterman
THEA 2040 R2
22 September 2015

ARTAUD
I found that I very much agreed and sympathized with Artaud. I admire how well hes
captured the majesty and magic of the theatre which he describes as the only place in the world
where a gesture, once made, can never be made the same way twice (761), and the power it
might wield therein; theatre utilized in the highest and most difficult sense possible, has the
power to influence the aspect and formation of things (764). In these descriptions, he justifies
his own theory that an expression does not have the same value twice, does not live two
lives (761). He exposes a growing fear for producing theatre that isnt easy to spectate upon,
and an inclination to a dull theatre that wishes a theatrical performance to leave the public
intact (762), and I sympathize with the stance he takes against it. I greatly admire that Artaud
calls us to action, he exempts us, artists, from relinquishing responsibility because there are too
many signs that everything that used to sustain our lives no longer does so, [and] that we are
mad, desperate, and sick (763). I believe that people have lost touch with their true selves, and
that essentially people nowadays are SO out of touch that when they see art that is shit, they
dont even know that its shit. They are simply too stunned and unaware, Artaud warns:
If we are prepared for war, plague, famine, and slaughtercontinue as we are, continue
behaving like snobs, rushing en-masse to see such and suchwhich never transcends the
realm of art (763).

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I agree with Artauds thoughts on the efficacy of this theatre of cruelty, which he
describes such that because the theatre is the only place in the world, the last general means we
still possess of directly affecting the organism, here meaning spectators, the spectator is in the
center and the spectacle surrounds him (765). He dares us to pursue a theatre that is at full
potential and transcendence, A theatre which, abandoning psychology, recounts the
extraordinary, stages natural conflicts, natural and subtle forces, and presents itself first of all as
an exceptional power of redirection (766).